


Arla Underwood's Last Night on Earth

by AvalonRoot



Category: Original Work, Twilight Zone
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-25 18:14:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30093132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AvalonRoot/pseuds/AvalonRoot
Summary: Arla Underwood gets cold feet about her upcoming wedding. Her life takes a strange turn when a lost coin turns up and she meets a man in a bar.





	Arla Underwood's Last Night on Earth

I steadied myself against the rough brick wall outside the bar as I emptied the contents of my stomach onto the concrete at my feet. I tried to keep it off my shoes by focusing on a couple of bricks in front of me, but you can imagine how well that worked.

Too much to drink? Probably. Gut tied into a knot even an Eagle Scout couldn’t untangle? Almost certainly. I tried to focus but my head kept spinning. No, not my head. A coin maybe? A ring? Why was I seeing that? Did it somehow signify that random chaos was the controlling principle of my life?

Some higher consciousness in my head was tut-tutting at the redundancy of that question when the thump of dance music exploded into the air, as if someone had popped trash bag by my right ear. The heavy bass notes made my stomach quiver. After the noise subsided, I heard footsteps.

“What’s wrong Arla? Did something you ate disagree with you?”

I waved a hand in the air and Lonnye, bless her heart, pushed a tissue into it. I wiped my mouth.

“Something is disagreeing with me, but I don’t think it was something I ate.”

I straightened up. My stomach muscles ached. Lonnye’s arrival must have thrown my rhythm off. Either that or my stomach was empty.

“Do you need anything? Some water maybe?”

I did something with my hand that I hoped would be taken as a dismissal of that idea. I hesitated to look at her.

“I’m okay. For a moment in there I felt a crushing weight descend on me. I was watching that guy take his shirt off, and I saw his oiled chest—”

“I’ve never seen a chest like that up close.”

Lonnye put her hand over her mouth, probably afraid that she had said too much. I nodded. It had been a nice chest.

“It probably wasn’t his chest, but suddenly a perfect storm of nausea formed in my stomach.”

I could see Lonnye shifting from one foot to another. She didn’t like standing out front like this. I could understand. I didn’t either, but at least she wasn’t out here doing performance art on the wall using a chunky brown palate. I knew it was time to go back inside, but my stomach threatened to start emptying again even if there wasn’t anything in there. It had a point to make and it was going to make it even if it meant just going through the motions.

“Listen, Lonnye. I can’t go back in there. Nothing against the show and the company but I need to be alone for a while.”

Lonnye put a finger in her mouth in a nervous gesture. She yanked it back out when she realized what she had done. She had a habit of biting her nails and I didn’t need the guilt of making her start again.

“Are you sure? I’m not sure I like this neighborhood.”

My lips fluttered in an attempted smile.

“I’ll be fine. This is no worse than the area around the apartment. Thank the others for me for a wonderful dinner and the strip show and everything. I’ll walk around for a bit and head home. I’ve got taxi money if I need it.”

She nodded uneasily.

“What about Con? If you get home too early—you know it’s bad luck for him to see the bride before the wedding day.”

“He’ll be staying with one of the guys after the stag party. I think our luck is safe.”

Throwing up outside a strip club the night before my wedding? Where could my luck go but up?

Lonnye nodded and went back inside. I left at a brisk walk hoping to be out of sight in case Janine or Sharon or some of the others wanted to come out and talk. Listen, I am all for talking about things that need discussing, but I didn’t dare talk about what I was feeling right now.

As I walked, I let my mind wander back to try to pinpoint that instant when my life fell apart. Well, it didn’t fall apart so much as start to sag under me. I hadn’t seen the stress fractures forming, but once I saw them there, I was horrified at how large they were.

When Con had asked me to marry him, I had said yes without much hesitation. We had been living together for a while and we were comfortable for the most part. Getting married just seemed like a natural extension of what we were doing now but with one difference. One vital difference.

Children. Con wanted them. Sure, I wanted them too, but something had changed in Con and he wanted them now, and I had smiled my best smile and held my ground for a little while. I had mentally considered driving nails into my feet to keep me from backing away from my stance, but it had all come to nothing.

Maybe I was just being selfish. I was an only child and had never learned to play well with others. I had been sickly until I was ten or so. It made me question my commitment to the relationship. Having children was the whole point of getting married, right? Who’s a selfish bitch then? Me.

I was ninety-nine percent sure I wanted marriage. Well, most of the time I was ninety-nine percent sure. Tonight, I was trending in the low seventies. There had always been a little uncertainty in my mind about getting married and having children. My mother and my girlfriends said it was normal.

My mind worried and picked at my uncertainty like a sheep dog trying to herd frightened sheep into a dark pen on a stormy night. No matter how hard I tried to corral it, somehow it would find a way over or under the gate and sit there daring me to ignore it.

My brisk pace matched my internal turmoil. It took almost walking into a pole to make me stop and take stock of where I was. Looking around I saw that I was on a corner, a literal crossroads, in front of me. There was a bar on the corner of the next street.

The door was propped open so that the sounds of the Country music coming from the jukebox could drift out and pull people in. Country music had that folksy, trustworthy feel that made people comfortable, made them want to sit for hours and drink beer. Neon signs advertising popular beer brands buzzed in the windows. The sound reminded me of the bug zapper in the back yard of my parent’s place.

I felt attracted to the place. I checked the time. It was almost midnight. My feet ached. I wasn’t used to these heels. I really needed to get back home. I had to be up early to get ready for my wedding.

I started walking with every intention of walking past the bar and going home, but it seemed that no matter which way I turned, the open door was always in front of me.

I glanced around to see if someone was playing a trick on me and that’s when I became aware that something was pressing into my foot. When I moved my shoe, I saw that it was something that was wedged into the gap between two paving stones.

I bent down and worked the object out of the gap. It was a quarter. There was something familiar about it, but the bad lighting on the street made it hard to examine. I shrugged and went inside.

There were plenty of stools free at the bar, so I grabbed the one to the left of the center. The coin was still in my hand. I spun it idly on the bar while I waited for the bartender. It spun while I ordered my drink, finally settling onto the bar when the bartender placed the glass in front of me.

When I looked down at it, I noticed that it was my father’s lucky coin. I knew that’s what it was because there was a nick on Washington’s eye that made it look like he had on fake eyelashes.

Whenever we had asked him why it was lucky, he told a different story each time. He had given it to me when I went off to college.

“If nothing else, you can use it to call home if you have to.”

“Nobody uses pay phones anymore, dad.”

He smiled. “Perhaps they should. We’ve all become tethered to these mobile phones. They’re nothing more than pocket jailers. You might as well be broadcasting your conversation to the world.”

The coin had gone missing in college. I had never found the nerve to tell my dad.

“What’s the coin for? Are you using it to plan the rest of your life?”

I looked up in surprise. At some point during my navel gazing a man had claimed a stool to my left. He had left a gap between us, which I appreciated.

“No, but maybe I should. What had seemed like a clear-cut decision to get married a few months ago has become all frayed around the edges.”

“What brought you to this bar? If you are looking for clarity or insight in that drink you just ordered I don’t think you’re going to find it.”

“The bar seemed to be in front of me no matter which way I walked.”

“That sounds like Fate then. Perhaps you were meant to meet me here and spend the rest of your life with me.”

I started to say something, but I realized that I was enjoying exchanging banter with this stranger. I picked up the coin.

“Let’s ask Ms. Fate directly. If it’s tails, I’ll go with you.”

“Seriously?”

I watched the word flow out of my mouth. I had lost control of my body. It was like watching myself in a home movie, but one I couldn’t remember making.

“Seriously.”

“Since you called it, I’ll flip it.”

Feeling lightheaded I placed the coin in his warm hand and put my hands on the bar to steady myself. I knew there was no way I’d leave this bar with him but even the pretense of it overloaded my senses.

He tossed the coin. I watched as the coin rose into the air and spin, but something strange happened. It was as if the coin had frozen in its flight and the room, the entire planet, was spinning around it.

I must have blacked out for a second because I felt my head starting to slump. A sharp sound snapped me out of my trance. I caught myself and hoped he hadn’t noticed. He held his hand palm down on the bar. That slap must have been the sound I heard.

“So—so what is it?”

Oh God, what if was tails? How did I know he hadn’t cheated? I should have watched closer.

He grinned and lifted his hand to reveal heads. He looked at it and shrugged.

“Now we’ll never know how our life together would have been.”

I went limp. He moved swiftly and caught me before I fell off the stool. Reflexively I reached out for him and we ended up in each other’s arms. I looked into his eyes and somehow, they didn’t look like the eyes of a stranger. Somehow, I felt that I had looked into those eyes deeply and often. He helped me straighten up.

“Thanks. I don’t know what got into me just then.”

He looked at me for a few seconds. My face felt hot. Maybe it was time to go home before I did something—let’s just say for the sake of argument—out of character for me.

“I, uh—”

“What really brought you to this bar?”

The change of subject broke the mood. I relaxed.

“The conversation is better here than at my place.”

“Oh, so it’s conversation you’re after then? Midnight always seems to bring out the conversationalists.”

“Not really, I guess. I think I was either heading for my apartment or for the airport, but I came to this bar first.”

“Oh, so you want to get away. Is there a posse after you?”

“Yeah, it’s made up of bridesmaids.”

“Cold feet?”

“Let’s just say that if you were to kiss them, your tongue would be stuck to them until spring.”

“Well, I wouldn’t mind but you’d probably get tired of me being underfoot.”

I grimaced.

“You’re worse than my dad.”

He shrugged.

“So where do you want to go?”

“Why?”

“I can take you there.”

Now would have been a good time to move to the other end of the bar, but I didn’t. He had gotten under my skin somehow. I flashed back to the coin toss and realized with surprise that I had wanted the outcome to be tails. I had wanted to go with him. I wasn’t too drunk to know what I was doing. I couldn’t blame this one on anybody but me. The home movie started again, and I said my lines.

“Surprise me. I don’t care where we go as long as it is out of this bar and out of this town.”

He had a two-seater that couldn’t have been more than two feet high off the street. I had to be lowered into it with the help of his more than capable arms. We had only been on the road a few minutes when I realized that I didn’t recognize it.

“What’s out here?”

I tried to sound calm as I thought about this man kissing me and uh, doing other things to me. This stranger. This man who was not Con.

“I thought I’d take you to the overlook.”

“The Overlook. Is that another bar? That doesn’t sound like much of a surprise.”

He smiled.

“No, it’s a real overlook. You know, a place you can pull up and park and see the view.”

“I’m pretty sure we don’t have any of those around town. The terrain is too flat. Maybe you should take me back if you’re not going to do what you said.”

He held up his hand with his fingers spread apart.

“Five minutes. I promise.”

He smiled again. He had a pretty smile. Everything my mother had taught me about men and their devious ways spilled out of my head and onto my shoulder before blowing away in the wind.

“Okay.”

He was a good as his word because he pulled into a clearing before five minutes had passed. I looked out into the darkness. It must have gotten cloudy because I didn’t see any stars in the sky. He got out then came around and helped me out. I was thankful because I couldn’t have done it on my own. Either my body had gotten super heavy or my brain had forgotten what arms and legs were for.

“This way.”

He took my hand and led me up a path. The ridge ahead of us was outlined against the dark sky. Tufts of grass, back lit by an unseen light, moved in a gentle breeze. He had found an overlook after all.

“Careful now, this last part is steep, and you might forget your footing once you see the view.”

I thought that forget was an odd choice of words, but I realized it was the perfect choice after we topped the ridge and I saw what was beyond. My mouth flew open and I almost fell down the hill. He held my hand tightly in his and I was grateful for the anchorage the pressure provided.

A galaxy—I’m assuming it was the Milky Way—floated below us. It looked to be about as wide and long as a football field, and the ridge we were on was about the level of one of the private boxes at say, Giant’s Stadium. Part of the galaxy was obscured by the rock we were standing on. A slight breeze rippled the grass at my feet and tickled my legs. My stomach insisted that I was falling, and I had to look away.

“Well, did I surprise you?”

I nodded. I don’t know how he had done it, but it looked real to me.

“Are we really out here? How could we have traveled all this distance in so short a time?”

“Is that what you really want to know? Did you ask me to bring you somewhere special so that I could deliver a physics lesson on the unity of space-time?”

I grinned and shook my head.

“I came with you because I need to make a decision and I need your help.”

He held out his arms.

“I’ll do what I can.”

I walked into his arms and felt them close around me. He picked me up and carried me to a place where we could see the galaxy below us. I pulled his face to mine.

I rested my head on the stranger’s chest and watched the galaxy below me. Con was down there somewhere probably wondering where I was.

“Are you ready to go home?”

His chest vibrated as he spoke.

“I can’t go home. What’s the point? I’ve cheated on Con and that’s the end of it.”

He shifted under me and I sat up, hugging my knees, suddenly shy. Why not though? I was naked before the universe. He settled beside me.

“Let me give you some perspective.”

The galaxy below me started to spin.

“Millions of years are passing each second.” He pointed. “Look.”

I looked in the direction he had indicated, and I saw something fuzzy resolve itself out of the blackness.

“What’s that?”

“That’s the Andromeda galaxy. It’s going to collide with the Milky Way in four billion years or so. Make that three billion years now.”

I watched as the two masses of stars moved closer together.

“Two billion years now.”

I watched them reach out for each other as lovers who have been separated for a long time might.

“One billion years now.”

Were there people down there? Had humans managed to last this long? Did they look anything like us?

“Zero.”

The galaxy that slowed and stopped spinning looked nothing like it had mere seconds ago.

“Are we really four billion years in the future?”

“Give or take. What are our lives compared to that? Have you made your decision? Is there somewhere else you’d like to go?”

“Why can’t I go with you?” Or am I just some hysterical woman with loose leg syndrome to you?”

He pulled me back to him, stroking my back with his hands.

“I’m happy with my relationships right now. I don’t need to take advantage of vulnerable women.”

“I’m sorry. That was mean of me. It’s just that my uncertainty is still there.”

“Okay then I have one more surprise for you. Let’s get dressed and I’ll show you.”

While I got dressed the image below us started spinning in reverse. It resolved itself into the original image just as I was pulling my shoes on.

On the drive back I thought about what I had done and how it affected things. I realized that I still loved Con and that I wanted to be with him, but marriage was still a big question mark in my mind.

“How long were we gone? I checked my phone, and I don’t have any reception right now.”

He looked at me and grinned.

“How long do you want it to be? When you flip a coin how long does it spin?”

“You’re starting to sound like a Zen koan. It doesn’t matter anyway. I don’t want to miss my wedding, I guess. Everybody is expecting me to be there. I don’t want to disappoint them.”

“Did what I showed you back there mean nothing? The universe has billions of years yet to run. I only showed you a fraction of the time.”

“That may be true but everyone I know lives day to day.”

He pulled into a parking spot and turned off the car. It had definitely gotten lighter. Could it be morning already? No, it looked more like early evening. I looked around.

“We’re back in town. You’ve parked next to the bar.”

He had gotten out and was standing on my side ready to help me unpack myself from the passenger seat.

“I’d say you have a future in play by play announcing if this wedding thing doesn’t work out.”

“But why? Do you expect me to just go home like nothing has happened?”

“Nothing did happen here, and that’s what counts, isn’t it?”

Nothing Happened? Being hurt or letdown after having sex is always a possibly but this was next level dissing. I wanted to scream at him, but instead, I steadied myself on the sidewalk and adjusted my clothes. Some sand had gotten in my underwear and it was scratching my hip. The fight had gone out of me.

“So, is this it?”

He shrugged.

“I’m going inside and have a few drinks and watch some television. I may dance with a few ladies if the situation presents itself. It’s late Monday afternoon. Your wedding, or lack of one, was two days ago. Go check out your life. I’ll be here if anyone decides to come with me.”

“Monday? If you’re playing with me, I’ll—”

I stopped talking, because I knew there was nothing I could do, short of leaping on him and tearing his eyes out. It was his show, and I was a bit player.

With a great deal of trepidation, I started walking to our apartment. I practiced my contriteness speech.

I don’t know what happened to me. I would have called but I didn’t have a connection.

Why am I even doing this? I should go to a bus station and take the first bus out of town.

I rolled my eyes. Melodrama doesn’t become you Arla. I may have blown the wedding, but I still had to find out if there was a future between Con and me, and the stranger knew it. He had forced the issue by taking me out of things until the weekend was over. I only had his word though, but I believed him.

Gathering my courage, I mounted the stairs to the apartment, unlocked the door, and went inside. I don’t know what I was expecting to see. Our honeymoon booking had run until Monday morning. We would have spent the afternoon driving back.

Yeah, but there wasn’t a honeymoon. Nobody was doing any driving back.

He had probably gone to work this morning. He wouldn’t be back for a few hours then. I looked at the empty living room. The place had a stale feeling about it like he hadn’t been there for days.

I put my hand to my mouth to block my sobs and made my way to the bedroom and threw myself on the neatly made bed.

It was dark in the room when I woke up hungry and dry mouthed. I got up and relieved myself and went to the kitchen. The refrigerator was mostly empty but there was a bottle of Champagne in there. It had been opened and re-corked, so it still had some fizz in it. There was half a bag of chips in the pantry. I didn’t recognize the name. Where could we have bought that? They tasted like nacho cheese, so they were, you know, good enough to go with the brand of Champagne I had.

I poured some Champagne into a water glass and drank it down. I wondered why he wasn’t back yet. The level of the bottle went down as I wandered around the apartment. A big knot was forming in my chest. I guess I had pretty much been in denial until now, or maybe I had lost the battle of keeping the enormity of what I had done out of my mind.

I hurried back into the kitchen to refill my glass and saw that the bottle was empty. That wouldn’t do. I searched the refrigerator and the kitchen for more alcohol and found a six-pack of beer pushed to the back of a lower shelf. I pulled it to the front and popped a can out of its plastic noose.

Opening it with a savage pull, I drank most of it down in one long swallow. My brain figured out where I was going with this, so I got the six-pack out and sat at the kitchen table. I drank the rest of them in twenty minutes or so. I was starting to feel drunk from the Champagne and I figured the beer would kick in in a few minutes, so I headed back to bed.

In an hour or so I was going to have to take the mother of all pisses.

In what must have been a record for delayed reactions, the stranger’s comment about anyone returning came back to me and honked my nose. Anyone? How many women had he taken to that overlook? Could he be talking about Con? Why would I want to show this man to Con?

I was in the bathroom taking that giant pee when I heard noises in the other room. There were snatches of conversation interspersed with the sounds of doors opening and unidentified things making thudding sounds.

Luckily, the last of the liquid had passed out of me so the sound of water on water wouldn’t give me away. I sat there with my underwear around my ankles and wondered what to do. Obviously Con was back, but why would he be talking to anyone? He had never brought anyone home from work before. I didn’t know what would be worse, explaining what I had done to him alone in our apartment or explaining what I had done in front of another man. It had better be another damned man. I grabbed some tissues and started to pat myself dry.

The knob on the bathroom door rattled. I had started pulling up my underwear and was going to call out to him while I washed my hands, but I didn’t get the chance. A voice—a damned woman’s voice—called from the kitchen. Well, he hadn’t wasted too much time getting over me, had he?

“Con, somebody has been here. They’ve trashed the place.”

The doorknob vibrated as the hand—Con’s hand apparently—was jerked off of it.

“I’m coming. Give me a second. I’m going to use the bathroom.”

“Con, someone has invaded this apartment. They may still be here, and all you can think to do is piss?”

I heard him mutter something that sounded like ‘damn high maintenance bitch’ before I heard him walking away.

I smiled. It served him right to hook up with a ball buster. That should teach him to cheat on me. My smile winked out when I realized that he would be even less likely to forgive me now.

I absently sat back down on the toilet. I had put the lid down from habit and the cool surface against my bare bottom caused me to yelp. I plastered my hand over my mouth fast enough to muffle it though.

I cupped my head in my hands and tried to decide what to do. I decided to wait until he came back in since I figured if I went out right now, it would only lead to, at a minimum, embarrassment and awkward moments. At least when he came back to the bathroom the excitement regarding the ‘mysterious intruder’ would have dissipated somewhat.

That was what I hoped anyway.

I listened to them go through the small apartment. Each slamming door marked another closet checked. It didn’t take long. Their voices grew louder as they came into the bedroom.

“You forgot to lock the door. That’s all there is to it. We were in a hurry to get out. I can understand that.”

The woman’s voice sounded familiar, but I couldn’t place it.

“I swear to you that I checked the door on my way out. You know how I’m always doing a final shake on it to make sure it’s locked.”

“I know Con honey, but we were in a hurry.”

The woman’s voice set my teeth on edge. In fairness it wasn’t her in particular. Any woman’s voice in my bedroom would have done the same thing.

“Okay, if it makes you feel better, I forgot to lock the door.”

Her voice turned butter soft.

“There, that wasn’t so hard, was it? People make mistakes sometimes. No harm done.”

Silence filled the room, and I began to wonder if they had left. Then I heard something drop onto the floor. Then I heard something else drop on the floor and the sounds of heavy breathing grew louder in the room. The bed rattled as someone did a controlled collapse onto it.

My God, they were having sex. My jilted groom was having sex in my bedroom with somebody he must have picked up at a bar. I knew the voices of all the women who had been sweet on him but this one didn’t sound familiar.

Anger boiled up in me as the bed started its rhythmic squeak. I looked around for something—anything—that I could use to slice his cheating balls off. I wasn’t able to find anything suitable so I resolved to just go out there and hope that I scared them enough to give them both heart attacks that would result in the agonizing deaths they both deserved.

I snatched the door open, but they were making too much noise to notice. The hussy’s legs were high in the air, Con’s hands pushing on the backs of them to force them even further over, so that they were about a foot away from her face, just like he did with me. God how I hated that position.

“Conway Gates, is this how you show your concern for me? I can see that you were really worried about where I was. Is this bitch helping you get over your loss?”

It was a funny sight to see them wiggle around in bed, searching for the sound of my voice, realizing that they were both naked, and that he was balls deep in another woman. At least it would have been funny if I hadn’t been the butt of the joke.

Con came to his senses first and rolled off the bed onto the floor. He stood up and faced me while the hussy pulled herself into a ball and screamed.

He took a step towards me.

“Arla—“

He broke off and looked at the bed with a question mark on his face.

“Arla?”

The woman on the bed found her voice.

“Get that bitch out of here right now. My God, she was in the bathroom listening to us have sex. How perverted.”

Con looked between us in confusion.

“But Arla.”

I wondered what was going on and then I realized what it was. The woman on the bed had pulled a pillow in front of her and she was screaming again. I think she was too upset to understand what she was seeing. Unfortunately, I was not as upset. The woman on the bed looked exactly like me.

“Get her out of here. Throw her off the balcony if you have to. Call the police. I want her out of my house.”

Con walked towards me and I backed out of the room. I wanted to put some distance between that strange woman and me. The woman who looked exactly like me. Was I that brittle and bitchy?

Con covered his crotch with his hands, which didn’t make him look too intimidating, and followed me out.

I found myself repeating the same thing over and over. “I’m so sorry, Con, I’m so sorry.” Until we reached the door.

“I’m sorry too, lady, but I’m the one who has to calm her down. How did you get in here?”

“Con, don’t you recognize me? It’s Arla. I stood you up at the wedding Saturday. Remember?”

His face hardened.

“Listen lady, I don’t know what your game is, but I got married on Saturday and that woman you just scared the shit out of is my wife.”

I sagged against the wall. How could that be? Had life somehow gone on without me?

“You said you left your door unlocked. Remember?”

“The door was locked. I just said that to shut Arla up.”

“But Con, can’t you see that I’m Arla?”

“What I see is a woman who broke into my house and scared my wife, and that’s all I’m ever going to see.”

I got the message. He watched me from the balcony as I walked past my car and out to the sidewalk. I didn’t look back and I didn’t hang around to try for my car. I didn’t know where I would drive it to anyway.

I had told the stranger to surprise me and he certainly had. In the movies what was happening to me now was called my comeuppance for my slutty actions. If they were any guide then I would wander around for a while, getting deeper and deeper into trouble before I was raped and my throat was slit in some alley, probably the one near the strip club, to provide bookends for the story.

It seemed to me that my punishment was far greater they my crime. Considering my crime, which part of it would be judged the worst, getting cold feet before the wedding, or having sex with a stranger in an act of desperation?

What should I do now? Maybe I should go back to the bar and see if the stranger was there. Yeah, like a guy like him would spend any more time than he had to in this town. He was probably just passing through and stopped to get a drink little realizing that it could be his lucky night if he played his cards right. He had said he would wait just to get rid of me.

That last part seemed a little prideful to that part of my mind that kept track of my bad behavior. Well fuck you part of my mind that keeps track of my bad behavior. I was a good catch. Several men had tried to and failed to get me to the altar. Con, for his part, had succeeded because he hadn’t tried that hard. Of course, maybe that had been an act. I doubted it though. Con was not into that subtleness thing. He said what he thought and pulled his foot out of his mouth later.

I had always felt comfortable with him. I think that was the thing that allowed him to close the deal when others had failed. The thing was, that man wanted kids like a cat loved catnip. He had probably worn that woman out during the weekend hoping to start a kid.

I had been off birth control for a month before the wedding to make sure there were no complications and because he hadn’t wanted to wait another second after we were married to start sowing his seed. That had been part of my cold feet. I wanted kids to, but in a hypothetical next year once we’re settled and in a real house kind of way.

As far as Con was concerned, we were as settled as we were going to get. All waiting did was push the time the kids further into the future.

I hadn’t paid attention to where I was going, so I was surprised when the bar sign came into view. My breath caught in my throat. His car was still there. Now I knew what a person trapped in a well must have felt when she heard voices and saw a light shine down on her face.

The on ramp to the Interstate was about five blocks further down the road. How the hell did we get from that place by the Interstate to that beach overlooking the universe? I knew we didn’t get on a plane. I knew we didn’t sit in his car for hours and hours. I was pretty sure he didn’t have a magic carpet in the trunk.

What was the story with this guy? Somebody who could make me see things like that might not be somebody I need to hang around. I stopped and stood there for a minute, regarding the situation. Was I ready to go in? What was holding me back?

He could have been lying about taking me with him, but I didn’t think so. Did I have a plan if I didn’t go with him? What did my future look like right now?

For one thing, where was I going to spend the night? I had been kicked out of the apartment. I couldn’t sleep in the car. Maybe I could go to my parent’s house. I smiled ruefully to myself. Yeah, that would work. My mother would be all over me about the honeymoon and they both would be wondering why I was not at home with my husband, making them the first of what they hoped were many grandchildren.

Even if I managed to sell them on some valid reason for my being there, they would expect me to go home at some point. No, the best thing to do right now was to go inside and talk to the stranger.

I gave a heavy sigh and was about to walk into the bar when I heard a car pulling up behind me. When it didn’t pass me, I got a little nervous and figured it might be someone checking me out. I’m not bragging when I say I have a nice butt. Con had wanted to plow it a couple of times, but I had been afraid to try it. All he ever got to plow was the north forty with side trips down my throat. The south forty was going to lay fallow for a long time.

The engine revved a little. The car was moving. It looked like my admirer had made a decision. I tensed myself for whatever was coming.

“Hey, Arla wait up.”

Well, I hadn’t seen that one coming. I turned to look at the woman who had hailed me and discovered that I was looking at myself behind the wheel of my car. I was holding a bottle of whiskey out the window.

“Who are you?”

It was a silly question I know, but what else do you say to yourself? It’s not a scenario you role play in the normal course of things.

“Me? My name is Arla, and you? You are the answer to my prayers.” She jiggled the bottle. “Get in. I’ll buy you a drink.”

I wasn’t sure I actually willed my body to move, but there it was, walking to the passenger side of the car. I opened the door and slid in. The other woman looked at me. I looked back at her then around the car. I felt the dash and slid my fingers over the seat.

“This feels like my car all right.”

“Well, it’s my car.” She pointed. “See? My keys are in the ignition. Note the fluffy bunny guarding them.”

She pressed the accelerator and the car surged forward, pressing me into the seat. I realized that she was wearing the same dress as me.

“Where are we going?”

“I’m hungry. How about you? My treat.”

“Okay.”

Eating something might help me cope. It had certainly helped in the past. Truthfully though? I suspected the whiskey would work the best.

I glanced at her and looked down. It was hard looking at her. It was just too damn unreal, that’s what it was. Unreal.

“So, what were you doing in my apartment?”

“It’s my apartment so I have every right to be there.”

“What’s your name?”

“Arla Underwood. What’s yours?”

She had already said her name was Arla, but I needed to hear her say it again to be sure.

“Arla Gates.” I saw a smirk on her face. “I said goodbye to Arla Underwood Saturday morning.”

“I was supposed to get married last Saturday.”

“Well, time moves on. What is it that Mr. Barton used to say? Tempus fugit?”

Mr. Barton? Right. Her eighth-grade science teacher. I pictured the galaxies colliding in my mind’s eye.

“I guess so.”

We pulled into a drive-in and the other Arla parked the car under a broken light near the end of the row.

“We shouldn’t attract too much attention back here. The folks in this town don’t need to know that I have a twin.”

“Yeah, well I didn’t know it either until twenty minutes ago.”

“So, you claim to be me.”

“I don’t claim to be you. I claim to be me.”

She glanced at the menu board beside the car and turned to me.

“I’m going to do a magic trick. I’m going to guess what you are going to order.”

“Fine.”

“You are going to get the combo three, a small Tastee Burger with no ketchup, with tater tots, and you are going to ask for a small cookie dough shake instead of a soda. How did I do?”

She damn well knew how she did. It was as plain as my stupidly gaping mouth.

“Fine. You did just fine. What are you going to have?”

She laughed and opened the bottle of whiskey, poured some into a couple of plastic cups, and handed me one.

“I’m going to have the same thing silly. How else did I know what you were going to order if we didn’t have the same favorites? Hold on while I order.”

She ordered and turned back to me.

“Point taken. Listen, I’m not going to stand by and let you take Con away from me.”

Why had I said that? Did I really mean it or was it something I felt obligated to say?

“Tell me again how you missed your wedding? Did you oversleep or something?” She stroked her chin with her left hand as if considering the question. “Well, I didn’t miss mine.”

She held out her left hand and turned it so that the gold caught the light while she took a drink from her cup.

“It looks like I’m the one with the ring on my finger. I think that was me in that bed back there being pounded by Con. What are you going to do to take that away from me? Kill me and throw me in the river? Bribe me? Make Con flip a coin?”

“You’re taking this a lot better than me. Other than that screaming fit in the bed, I mean. Why is that?”

“It’s like I said when I called out to you. You’re the answer to my prayers.”

“But why? What would possibly make you say that? You’re married to a great guy and you both have a bright future. I have no idea what my future is going to be.”

“Answer a few questions for me.”

“If I answer them will you explain yourself?”

“If you answer them correctly I will. If you don’t then it won’t matter, will it?”

“I don’t know. Ask your questions.”

Our orders arrived. I kept my face in the shadows to avoid confusing the girl who brought the food.

“Okay. First question then. What was that girl’s name?”

“Abigail Turner. I babysat her.”

“What are my parent’s names?”

“Willa and Michael Underwood.”

“Okay, let’s move to some harder questions. Name the boy who first kissed me.”

“Tanner Davis.”

“Name the boy who made it to first base.”

“James McKenzie.”

“Name the boy who made it to home plate.”

“William Anderson. I worried for days after that if I was pregnant or not. I was so stupid to let him do that without protection. Well, how am I doing?”

She didn’t answer right away, but her eyes were locked on me like I was Jesus at the Second Coming. I scrunched back in my seat and averted my eyes.

When she spoke again it seemed that her words were coming from some place deep inside her, and that they were very heavy, as heavy as a supertanker carrying giant economy sized anvils, making it an effort to move them through her system and out her mouth.

“Did you have severe asthma as a child?”

“Yes.”

“Did you—did you take a relatively new medication when you were having a particularly bad bout of it? Did your doctor say that if you didn’t take it you would probably die?”

The words came out slowly, drawing the moment out as long as possible. It seemed that my answer would be the most important answer this woman had ever received, and she wanted to know it more than anything, but she was also afraid of it at the same time.

“The doctor said it was a toss-up, but if I took it, I would likely be infertile. My mother prayed for a moment then asked my father to toss his lucky coin. My mother said that if was heads then I would be allowed to take the medication.”

I stopped to catch my breath, remembering that time long ago, remembering that I now had that same coin in my pocket. The other woman reached over and poured another drink. Her hand shook. I took it and drank it without thinking.

“What was it?”

“Tails. I didn’t take the medication and with a lot of effort I was able to pull through.”

“My God.”

She put her head down and I could tell by her body language that she was crying. Her hand seemed to forget that it was holding the whiskey, so I grabbed it before it spilled.

“What’s the matter?”

She didn’t answer right away. She found a tissue and wiped her eyes. She looked up a few minutes later. Her right hand went to her left hand and pulled the wedding ring off her finger.

She reached for my left hand and before I realized what she was doing she had slipped the ring on me. Mechanically I held my hand up to the light and looked at it.

“Why did you do that?”

She smiled weakly.

“See, I’m not trying to take anything away from you. I know you want it. You wouldn’t have showed up here if you didn’t.”

She got out of the car and went to the passenger’s side and gestured for me to move over. Numbly I slid to the left side behind the steering wheel.

“What is going on?”

“Does your phone work?”

Puzzled, I took it out. It had not been able to detect a signal.

“No signal. I haven’t had one since Friday night.”

She pulled her phone out of her pocket.

“Here, take this one. I’ll take yours.”

“Wait a minute. What’s going on?”

“I’m giving you my life. The toss ended up heads for me and I took the medicine. I was cured but I’m infertile. Con doesn’t know.”

“My God, how could you have done such a thing?”

“I thought maybe my condition would change in time. I thought I could convince him to adopt a baby. I don’t know. I only know that I wanted him. Now that I have him, I’ve realized what a cruel trick I’ve played on him. I want to make it right. I prayed for help and here you are. Apparently, the only difference of significance between us is that you can have children and I can’t. I’ll fill you in on the things we did on the honeymoon. It won’t take long, if you get my meaning. Goodbye Arla. Oh, here’s my wallet too. Let me have yours.”

I handed it to her, feeling my identity slipping away with each transaction. Dimly, a feeling swirled around me that I should be fighting this. If I went through with this then I was as good as married to Con and I’d have no choice but to go back to the apartment and start living this woman’s life. This was why the stranger had brought me back. I had put off my decision long enough. It was time to decide.

“Look, I’m sorry you have regrets but you need to work them out with Con. I can’t take your place.” I took the ring off and handed it to her. “Here’s your ring back. Give me my phone and wallet please.”

“Why are you doing this? You have to take my place.”

“I have to? Why do I have to?”

“Don’t you want to?”

“I’m just guessing here, but I think you did the same thing I did on Friday night. The only difference might have been what you did when that guy offered to take you somewhere.”

“What guy? I went to a bar and had some drinks. Janine and the others found me and talked me into going back home. Did you do something different? Is that why you’re here now?”

“Yeah, something very different happened to me. Look, I’m sorry about your situation but I can’t help you.”

She reached over and grabbed my arm.

“But you’ve got to. I can’t go back there.”

“Why?”

“Because I’ve made a terrible mistake. I loved Con, I really did, but as soon as I said the marriage vows, I knew I had made a mistake. When we said the vows, something must have clicked inside him. He doesn’t see me, he sees what I can do, uh, thinks I can do. I don’t know why I didn’t see it sooner.”

“He wanted kids. You knew that. You should have told him before you got married.”

I pulled at her hand, but she didn’t release her grip.

“Yes, but I’ve always wanted more out of life than children. I’m selfish. You don’t have to tell me. Is it so wrong to want to be a full person, not someone who is Con’s wife or Con’s children’s mother?”

I thought about telling her to get out, but I realized it was her car. Belatedly I had seen what she had been doing. Little by little she was getting me to buy into being her and she wasn’t going to let what I wanted to do change that. I jerked my arm from her grip and got out of the car.

“Where are you going?”

I started walking, ignoring her question. It was time to go back to the bar and beg the stranger to take me back to wherever it was that he had found me. I wasn’t going to run away from what I wanted anymore.

I had reached the street when I heard an engine revving behind me. Seconds later, tires squealed as someone punched the accelerator. I looked around in time to see her car bearing down on me. I jumped aside and rolled on the grass next to the pavement to break my fall.

I was able to get a look at her as she drove past. Her eyes were fixed on the road. I’m willing to bet that she hadn’t even seen me. Why had she floored it like that then?

My legs were wobbly, and I had to grab a nearby pole to get into a standing position. Thankfully, nobody came out to check on me. After a few deep breaths I was able to control my body well enough to start walking. I headed for the bar.

I needed to keep my mind off the future, so I thought about my current situation. Was what just happened the second phase of my comeuppance? Was I still paying for my bad behavior? Did that part of me that kept track of my bad behavior want to hazard an opinion? Was being raped in an alley going to be the next act in this farce?

It irritated me that I had been unable to make this decision without the help of a man. A man willing to take me to see the wonders of the universe before putting me in a tender trap where my empathy for the other Arla would push anything like rational thought out of my head.

I sighed. I couldn’t push all of this onto him. I had to take the responsibility. The stranger had only been the facilitator, the means to the end. Had he known this was going to happen? What had he said?

“I’ll be here if anyone decides to come with me.”

It hadn’t been Con he was talking about. It was the other fucking Arla. A thought drifted into my head, its cold tendrils ran through my chest and formed an icy lake in my gut. Where had she been going? Why was I even asking? I knew where she was going.

I started running. If she got there first and talked him into leaving—the thought derailed in my head like a freight train trying to take a curve going way too fast before jumping the tracks and spiraling into a dark abyss. It couldn’t complete. Completion would lead to despair and despair would cause me to lose my mind.

Her car was there, parked halfway on the sidewalk. I looked inside as I walked past. The keys were on the seat along with the ring and the other stuff. The stranger’s car was gone. Secretly admiring my strength in the face of adversity, I went into the bar on the off chance that he was still there—that maybe someone had stolen his car.

He wasn’t inside, and she wasn’t inside either. I was about to walk out when someone called my name. I turned to see the bartender looking at me. He held a piece of paper in his hand.

“Arla Underwood?”

“Yes, I’m Arla.”

“A man left here a few minutes ago.” He waved the paper. “Left a message.”

I went to the bar and took it.

“Was a woman with him? Someone who looked a lot like me?”

He nodded.

“Thanks.”

I held the note in my hand wondering what he could possibly have written that I would want to read. I thought about tearing it up, but in the end, I opened it and read it.

“You were right to stay here. If I’m right, you’ll remember everything when this is over. Watch the skies at one seventeen tonight for your final decision.”

After the tenth time, I tore the note into as many pieces as I could. The bartender graciously swept them into a trashcan. I ordered a drink. I might need several, I decided, before I went home to face Con.

The car and its contents were still there when I came out. I slipped the ring on my finger and put the other stuff in my pockets. I drove back to the apartment. I looked at the sky as I walked from the car to the stairs. The moon was full, turning the parking lot into a lake of silver. I touched the hood of Con’s car as I walked past. It was cool to the touch.

I twisted the ring absently as I climbed the stairs. I let myself in hoping to see Con pacing the floor. Come to think of it, why hadn’t he called or gone out looking for me, uh, her? I tried to be quiet and slip into bed without waking him, but that move had futility written all over it.

No sooner was I in the bed than he turned over and looked at me.

“That was a long run to the convenience store.”

So that had been her excuse to go out at this time of night. I tried to think of something and went with the obvious.

“Uh, some of the girls were there and we, you know, got to taking about the ring and the honeymoon. We lost track of time.”

“Hens will cluck.”

I bit back my first reply.

“I guess you’re right. Silly hens.”

He moved over and put his arms around me. I tried not to pull away. I’d talk to him in the morning about my doubts, but tonight I was too damned drained to bring it up. For a change he didn’t bend me double, which I appreciated.

He also didn’t seem to notice that I didn’t do much, which made me wonder if he was doing this more to mark the new order of things rather than the desire for my flesh. Welcome to married life, Mrs. Gates. Did you remember to leave your inner life at the altar?

Not me. I never went to the altar.

Was that what the other Arla had realized after she had said her vows? That she was giving up just a tad more than Con was? Who needs an inner life, right? It would only get in the way.

It was only after he had emptied himself into me that I remembered that I wasn’t on any birth control. Fuck and double fuck.

He rolled over and was asleep not long after making his deposit. I went to the bathroom, got cleaned up, and put on a fresh undershirt. When I was done, I couldn’t force myself to climb back in bed with him. I needed a drink, but the only bottle of knew of was in the car. Sighing, I pulled on some jeans and sneakers and headed downstairs.

The moon had moved a little further across the sky. I remembered watching the galaxies collide. Had I really seen four billion years into the future? I unlocked the car and sat down to look for the bottle. Her wild driving had probably thrown it on the floor somewhere. I put the key in the ignition, turned it until the interior lights came on, and started peering under the seats.

A few minutes later my hand closed around a squarish glass bottle and I knew I had it. I pulled myself back into a sitting position and went to turn off the lights. Out of habit my eyes scanned the dashboard and stopped on the time. It was one fifteen. What had the note said? Watch the skies at one seventeen?

Well, I was up, and I didn’t want to go back into the apartment. I turned off the lights and screwed the cap off the bottle and took a drink. No need to stand on ceremony out here.

Watch the new bride get wasted in the parking lot. Shows nightly.

I took a drink and then another. I wanted to check the time, but I didn’t want to wake up the car again. Had I thought to bring my phone with me? I had. I took it out and checked the time. Almost one seventeen. What was I supposed to be looking at? I didn’t know and I didn’t care. I took another drink.

What was up with the moon? The bottle fell out of my hands as I watched the moon start to spin like a huge coin in the sky. How could that be? The moon wasn’t flat. It only looked that way. Well, it was flat enough for real now. Its speed increased and the sky seemed to be pulled along with it. The stars started to flutter around in the sky like fireflies.

Is this the end of the world? Is that what the stranger had meant? Fuck him for leaving me here to die. Serves me right.

My comeuppance had arrived, but it looked like I wasn’t going to suffer it alone.

Suddenly the moon was growing, heading for the Earth. I wondered what was going happen when it collided with the Earth. Nothing good, that’s what.

The passenger door opened. I turned my head to see who it was, to see who would be climbing into my car at the end of the world.

“Wow, you’ve done a number on that bottle.”

I looked at the bottle and nodded.

“I had a little help from the bitch that ran off with you.” I glanced at the sky and shrugged. “It looks like we’re all going to die anyway, so I forgive you and I forgive her.”

His gaze followed mine.

“I see what you mean. You certainly cut it close, but I think you’ll be fine.”

“Close? I don’t understand. What does any of this have to do with me? You talk like I’m the center of the universe.”

He looked at me and took my hand.

“You are, Arla. You are. What’s going to be your answer? Which way do you want the coin to fall?”

Coin? Who the fuck cares?

I looked in his eyes again and realized that they could be mine.

“Tails. I want it to be tails.”

“Then drive.”

“Where?”

“To the Interstate. Hurry”

I started the car and put it in gear. It jerked forward a few feet.

“Whoa. I must be drunker than I thought. What if I have an accident or get stopped?”

“Don’t sweat the small stuff. Move.”

I glanced up at the sky. The spinning moon had gotten much larger. The car fishtailed as I raced through the parking lot and turned onto the street.

“Goodbye Arla. Maybe I’ll see you again someday.”

“What? I can’t do this without you.”

I shot a glance at him and he smiled.

“Sure you can. It’s your universe.”

Then he was gone.

“Shit shit shit,” shot gunned out of my mouth.

Had all of this been a fucked-up wish fulfillment fantasy? Was I still in the strip club with Lonnye, Janine, and the others, destined to go through my life, what there was left of it, wondering about might have beens?

I white-knuckled the wheel and forced my eyes back to my driving and raced down the street towards the Interstate with that spinning moon strobing the sky behind me.

My hands were numb from gripping the back of the chair I was using to support myself. I held my breath as I watched the coin come to rest on the table. To prolong the suspense, it did that little rolling thing coins did—pitch rising as it vibrated faster and faster—before it landed tails up and silence reclaimed the room. I stared at it and realization dawned. I wasn’t going to take the medicine.

“Yes!”

My ten-year-old knees decided that they couldn’t hold me anymore and my body collapsed onto the floor.

“Good heavens. Arla has fainted. We shouldn’t have let her watch. It was too stressful for her.”

I felt my dad’s strong, gentle hands helping me up.

“She’s a fighter. Are you all right sweetie?”

“Thanks Dad. I’ll be okay. I’m so glad I don’t have to take that medicine.”

I knew that I’d pull through. After all, I had already done it once.


End file.
